Scott Cooper’s “Hostiles”

Hostiles (2017)

Revisionist western that never quite manages to be more than average despite a collection of massive talent

Christian Bale, Rosamund Pike, Jonathan Majors, Jesse Plemons, Wes Studi, Timothée Chalamet, Stephen Lang and more in the cast and a story by the screenwriter of “Missing” Donald E. Stewart yet this sombre, long-winded(133 minutes) somehow never breaks orbit from the ordinary when it should have been extraordinary. The stellar cast is fantastic with what they’re given particularly Bale and it does so much right. It’s been lauded for its use of the Cheyenne language, its unflinching violence, and good cinematography from Masanobu Takayanagi but Cooper’s screenplay feels strangely flat. It would be great to read Donald E Stewart’s original story particularly as it was written at about the same time as “Missing” for which we won an Oscar.

On another level, the story is about a 1000 mile journey and yet it hardly feels like that as they’re blessed with blue skies for most of the journey, a child friendly river crossing, and aside from the human threats, there isn’t much to hint at the epic scale of much more than the vistas. It’s difficult not to contrast it with something like Alejandro G. Iñárritu’s The Revenant which felt present and real with an environment like another adversary. Furthermore, those kind of comparisons also reveal the lack of dimension in Hostiles from which it’s hard to much out of it aside from the obvious: it’s hard to hate someone you get to know. On top of that, there is a seriousness to the film that doesn’t quite feel earned.

It’s watchable and interesting if only for the talent on show but it’s hard to shake the feeling that this should have been more.